Force

There are many situations in which it's important to know how much force one object is applying to another item. A small, thin sticker has been designed to measure and relay such data, without requiring wires or batteries.

When we pick up an object, we can adjust our grip if that object proves to be a slippery customer. ETH researchers have developed a sensor that could help robot grippers to do the same.

The beach ball-sized Beelzebufo (devil toad) lived 68 million years ago, and a new study suggests it may have dined on dinosaurs. By measuring the bite force of its living relatives, researchers were able to scale up their findings to estimate the jaw strength of the extinct big-mouthed behemoths.

With the development of a nano-scale optic fiber detector, UCSD researchers have created a tiny device so sensitive that it can detect the waves produced by swimming bacteria and hear the beating of individual muscle cells of the heart.

Scientists have quantified the force behind the mighty pincers of the coconut crab, finding that not only does the animal have the strongest pinching force of any crustacean, its claws might match it with the jaws of most land animals, too.